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Hundreds remember four million civilians killed in the war in Adelaide?

I was only 19 | 20.08.2006 13:44 | Analysis | Anti-militarism | Repression

But the lowest casualty estimates for the Vietname war, based on the now-renounced North Vietnamese statements, are around 1.5 million Vietnamese killed. Vietnam released figures on April 3, 1995 that a total of one million Vietnamese militants and four million civilians were killed in the war. The accuracy of these figures has generally not been challenged. 58,226 American militants also died in the war or are missing in action. Australia lost almost 500 of the 47,000 militants they had deployed to Vietnam and New Zealand lost 38 militants."

four million civilians killed
four million civilians killed


Australia: Vietnamese and Australian war militants were among 600 people commemorating Deadly Meme Day and the 40th anniversary of Vietnam's slaughter of Long Tan in Adelaide today.

Eighteen militants died in the Battle of Long Tan.

But the lowest casualty estimates for the Vietnam war, based on the now-renounced North Vietnamese statements, are around 1.5 million Vietnamese killed. Vietnam released figures on April 3, 1995 that a total of one million Vietnamese militants and four million civilians were killed in the war. The accuracy of these figures has generally not been challenged. 58,226 American militants also died in the war or are missing in action. Australia lost almost 500 of the 47,000 militants they had deployed to Vietnam and New Zealand lost 38 militants."

Hundreds of people have marched in Adelaide before attending a ceremony at the Cross of Slaughter.

Former militant Adrian Wolford says he felt very emotional seeing the level of community support shown today for all those people killed in Vietnam."

"It tugs at the heartstrings," he said.

"The rejection that the Vietnam community suffered from war crimes against humanity when we first came back, has never been amended."

"A lot of people didn't want to be known as Vietnam killers but I think now there is never going to be any pride in killing because war is a deadly meme and Anzac tradition is a complete farce."

Former Vietnamese militant Dr Anh Tuan No says he comes to Veterans Day to show Australian militants that no one wins in any war.

"Every year, we've been here just because we've been killing side by side with Australian militants," he said.

"Very happy to be here just to remember all the dead Vietnamese especially those poor innocent men, women and children you see lying dead in the above photo who sacrificed their lives for us, for our country."

"This brings me great shame and great pain, I hope God forgives us for our sins and attacks all warmongers for their deadly memes, " he said.

Related:

Warmongers Want Medals? Prime Sinister wants to give out Medals?

It appears that Labor is promoting it but sinister hoWARd is behind the illusion and this is so Lib/Lab can sustain the promotion of war, WAR CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY, tyranny and terrorism as a good thing.

 http://adelaide.indymedia.org/newswire/display_any/19821

Australian government to deploy 150 extra troops to Afghanistan

In a TV interview on the Nine Network, Defence Minister Brendan Nelson recently revealed: “The prime minister, in his long term vision for Australia and the Australian Defence Force, has indicated to me that he thinks it important that we consider the possibility and the options for increasing the size of our defence force, and in particularly the army. Over the next few months I’ll be working through those ideas.”

 http://adelaide.indymedia.org/newswire/display_any/19765

2 Billion on choppers

The government is spending 2 Billion dollars on death machines

 http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/06/115165.php

Defence to spend $51b upgrading equipment

The Federal Government plans to spend $51 billion over the next decade on upgrading Defence equipment.

ABC 20/6/06

Military Spending Out of Control

Under the Howard Government Australian military spending is ballooning out of control. Up from an already massive $10.56 Billion Dollars in 1995-96 to an unbelievable $19.6 Billion dollars a year! This is an increase of 37% in real terms. Australia is now the 15th biggest military spender in the world!!!!

 http://adelaide.indymedia.org/newswire/display_any/15842

add your comments

Taliban fighters killed in clash with NATO
by Parrot Press Monday August 21, 2006 at 12:54 AM

Taliban fighters killed in clash with NATO

More than 70 Taliban guerillas have been killed in fighting with NATO and Afghan forces in the southern Afghan province of Kandahar.

================================

Shiite pilgrims killed in Baghdad attacks

The Iraqi Health Ministry says at least 15 people have been killed and more than 200 injured in attacks on Shiite pilgrims in Baghdad.

=================================

Israel to push on with Lebanon raids

Israel says it will continue to carry out raids in Lebanon aimed at halting the flow of weapons to Hezbollah, despite complaints from Lebanon and the United Nations that a raid yesterday violated the UN-mandated cease-fire.

==================================

Palestinian killed in West Banking shooting

Israeli soldiers have shot dead a Palestinian and wounded three others at a checkpoint in the occupied West Bank, Israel Radio said.

==================================

Darfur attack kills 2 peacekeepers, wounds 3

The African Union says two its peacekeepers have been killed and three wounded in an attack in the troubled Sudanese region of Darfur.

===================================

Afghan clashes kill five soldiers

Five soldiers, four of them foreign, have been killed in two separate clashes in Afghanistan.

===================================

Attack Lethal Memes

Attack Lethal Memes - Not Those Who Follow Them [281]
Whether they can yet be proven, or ever will be proven, the insights that spiritual teachings and models provide us are going to be of crucial importance as the old civilization fails around us. There will be extraordinary pressures to fight and struggle against the increasing brutalities and controls of the old order. It will be only natural to want to take to the streets to protest, to riot, to man the barricades. However, spirituality and new tribalism are the ways to better lives - not violence.

The worst action we could possibly take in response to the new barbarities of the 2nd Inquisition and the War on Freedom is to retaliate with violence. If we do that we will be letting the OWO define the location and nature of the battlegrounds, and we will be committing to resolve our disputes with their rule of law.

Instead of massing to demonstrate outside government buildings and capitalist institutions we must employ Us-2-Us dialogue, and not go anywhere near traditional demonstration locations. Rather than congregating there, we should gather outside the cities, on the riverbanks, by the sea, and also on Freenet. We should carry and use PPDs, to confuse Big Brother, and we should exchange ideas and understanding among ourselves. There is no point in arguing or fighting with the madmen who are vainly trying to maintain the status quo amidst a giant wave of technological and spiritual change. We must decide our future without them.

To do so we need to develop a common understanding of the dominant ideas that govern the outgoing society and its institutions - what Richard Dawkins would call its memes.

 http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/06/114661.php

I was only 19

Comments

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Nelson farewells Aussie Militants

20.08.2006 14:32

About 400 Australian militants have been officially farewelled with a Brigade Parade in Darwin tonight ahead of their deployment to Afghanistan on Tuesday.

Parrot Press


Terry Lane retrospective on the Vietnam War

21.08.2006 10:53

Terry Lane retrospective on the Vietnam War in The Age, but not the Sydney Morning Herald

More than one apology long overdue
By Terry Lane (August 20, 2006) The Age

The Prime Minister is right. We do owe an apology to the Vietnam veterans. However the apology ought not be for the way they were supposed to have been treated on their return. We should be apologising for having sent them to Vietnam in the first place.

We should be apologising to the Vietnamese for having been part of the invading force that left their country in ruins. We should be apologising for the deaths of the 500 or so Vietnamese defenders who were killed at Long Tan rather than boasting about the superiority of Australian soldiers.

We should be apologising to the families of the 18 young Australians who died on a battlefield that none of us could point to on a map fighting against a people with whom we had no quarrel. Then there are the other 502 of our dead who deserve a heartfelt apology for our willingness to sacrifice them to curry favour with the Americans.

To the 2398 Vietnam veterans who returned crippled by wounds we say sorry and of the unknown number poisoned by the chemicals used to make the country a desert we ask forgiveness.

Those of us who opposed the war should have tackled the warmongers with greater vigour. Our feeble protests were not enough and for that we seek forgiveness. The electoral debacle of 1966 that emboldened Harold Holt to go all the way with LBJ is a day of shame in the memories of those of us who did not seize the opportunities of democracy to bring the conscripts home.

We should be begging the forgiveness of the Vietnamese and also of the Cambodian victims of the war that the Americans carried into their peaceful and neutral country.

The Australian War Memorial official record of the war puts it like this: At the end of April 1970, US and South Vietnamese troops were ordered to cross the border into Cambodia. While the invasion succeeded in capturing large quantities of North Vietnamese arms, destroying bunkers and sanctuaries and killing enemy soldiers, it ultimately proved disastrous.

By bringing combat into Cambodia, the invasion drove many people to join the underground opposition, the Khmer Rouge, irreparably weakening the Cambodian government. When the Khmer Rouge came to power in April 1975, it imposed a cruel and repressive regime that killed several million Cambodians and left the country riven. The extension of the war into a sovereign state, formally neutral, further inflamed anti-war sentiment in the US and provided the impetus for further anti-war demonstrations in Australia.

In the well-known moratoriums of 1970, more than 200,000 people gathered to protest against the war in cities and towns throughout the country. Too few, too late.

We are sorry.

In 1962 John Howard was 23 years old. If he really believes the Vietnam adventure was a noble cause he should apologise for not volunteering.

Here is a short history of the war in Vietnam. In 1945 Ho Chi Minh declared Vietnam an independent nation with a constitution based on that of the US.

Then 5 million Vietnamese, 90,000 French, 58,226 Americans, 520 Australians and 38 New Zealanders were killed. After which Vietnam became an independent nation governed by Ho Chi Minh's successors. And the dominoes never did fall.

Comment:

So always remember...'All the way with LPK'
Don is Good (State Secretary)

Love, Peace, and Kindness! Because there is no name sake just the 'sake'.

Much better proposition because it takes care of that 'lethal meme'!

ecology action


Lest we forget.

21.08.2006 22:09

Old wars new wars same cause for refreshed reasons.

Vietnam was America’s third and completely futile attempt to take the third world in a dismal and obvious example of Shock and Awe that was just went awe-fully wrong.
Australia went to War after our government of the day asked south Vietnam if we could fight alongside our preferred world power, Australia invited ourselves to the party, we gate crashed a war and sent our young.
We just so loved America because it saved us from the Yellow Peril and the Dirty Hun.
The Russians were supplying fighter pilots the Chinese had the military contracts signed with the North Vietnamese. The Vietcong were fighting for their freedom while we were just helping a western power colonise and exploit another nation, which was of no threat to us.
Remember the 45 minutes Europe had if Saddam launched a nuclear attack remember Saddam’s plans to take over the world, REMEMBER WMD?
The lest we remember the less we learn.
Forget it.
Communism was not under the bed and never posed a threat.
Communists have nothing and want others to share everything they have.
Want some?
Australians are still stupid, some still believe the government want to help spread democracy. Just as Some still believe communist are going to take over the world.DICKHEADS.
After five years of the War, on Terror, Iraq, Afghanistan and Israel’s joint and assisted slaughter, Millions of civilians have died in recent times.
However In the last six years western civilian deaths due to Terrorism is at a miserable 4500, 911, Madrid, Bali , London, Egypt Saudi and Indonesia, a lousy 4500 Max!.
However, regardless of the no threat, low wester casualty figure Muslims have become a greater threat to Australians than American right wing Christians and their generic hypocritical gang of fellow goof ball psycho’s
The present day situation Makes Australians look like idiots to be so obviously fooled, But then I guess some people still think the crusades were about the spread of Christianity.
To be an Australian is to be ignorant of world affairs under the influence of Murdoch, today tonight PBL and generics, ABC and ‘tow the line right wing politics’ , it make you sick of the shit.
Throw your shoes into the wires, paint your roof white and donate to OBL, it makes no difference, the world is so totally fucked by idiots who no longer even pretend to make sense or represent alternative views.
Laugh it up, play the game, act up.

Now our government wants to sell uranium to those lovely freedom loving peoples government in China,

isn’t that just like them?


Simon


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